We try to run from the fight as fast as possible, needing to drive to a safe distance from the star before we can jump away. At first, the enemy's weapons can't get through our shields, but then they launch a Siege Ion shot at them, taking both shield generators down at once. Then the enemy's weapons don't
have
to get through our shields, and several laser shots start pounding our ship.
Luckily, the engines are still fine, so we're able to jump away.
. A jump made very early in a jumpcycle. This wastes useful time, because a ship waiting in hyperspace gets frozen in time until the pull, but it can be the only way to escape a dangerous situation or to stay undercover.
We waste no time trying to repair, knowing that we're only going to take more damage, and jump out of the fight. There's another pirate ship here, but luckily this one doesn't have ion weaponry. It's busy attacking someone else, and we're in no fit state to take it on, so have to leave while the pirate's distracted.
I initially rashly assumed you'd decide to fight it, but the resulting fight quickly turned out to be unwinnable; you don't have much influence on a fight with your weapons system down, and its missiles could take us out due to the damage to Piloting. As a result, I'm enforcing the only decision that lets us continue the run. Sorry about that. Good thing this beacon didn't have an unavoidable fight!
A class of small Mantis ships that prey on civilians, looking for an easy way to make kills and earn money from the debris.
With the pirate ignoring us for easier prey, we managed to repair our damaged systems while leaving the beacon, so everything that can be fixed is at full strength by the next jump. There was a tiny Mantis ship here, but it cowardly jumped away as soon as it saw us. On the other hand, it was looting a wreck, so we get to do some scavenging of our own. We pick up ⛯11 and a bomb launcher.
Someone who deals in the trade in sentient creatures. HIghly illegal, but unfortunately hard to stop.
It seems like criminals are getting ballsy, looking to trade with the Federation. There's a slaver here, who's apparently quite willing to sell slaves to a Federation military ship. This one has Rock crew on offer, with the best price being ⛯27.
We don't have to trade. We could just leave, or we could attack them. Looking at the slaver's ship, we see two shield barriers, plus a small missile launcher and Siege Ion, but we don't have any more information available than that.
PvtUrist demonstrates what he thinks of the trade with an EMP to the slaver's shields, then starts shooting lasers at the enemy weapon systems. The slavers respond with Artemis missile fire; although we take out their missile launcher, they eventually get it back online and land a few more shots on us, although they rapidly run out of ammo. When we take their weapons back down again – and then break their shields with our beam – they decide to run away, and unfortunately PvtUrist misses the next several shots, meaning we have no way to stop them fleeing, and they get away. I guess they're used to this sort of encounter.
A nickname for any trade that's really unfavourable for one party. Normally these are intentionally and maliciously aimed at inexperienced pilots who don't know better, but occasionally they're accidentally offered by pilots who don't know better.
We cross paths with a ship at the beacon. They're offering us a used drone, with no control unit or fabricator, and want quite a lot of fuel in exchange. We have no use for this thing, it's almost worthless even to someone who has use for it, and we don't have that much fuel anyway. What sort of fool did they think we were?
A shipyard that's hired by a government for exclusive repair and maintenance of their ships. Instead of paying in advance, the payment for use of their services is delivered on the ships that are being fixed; this helps prevent rogue shipyards running off with the money, or a prepayment falling into enemy hands.
The Federation don't own the shipyard here, but it's being run for their benefit; there aren't any other Federation ships here right now, but many of them will have come here in the past to get fixes. Although primarily focused on repairs, they're also able to do more drastic upgrades to the ship's systems if necessary.
(I'll post price lists in the various players' PTs.)
In post 282, callforjudgement wrote:PvtUrist demonstrates what he thinks of the trade with an EMP to the slaver's shields, then starts shooting lasers at the enemy weapon systems. The slavers respond with Artemis missile fire; although we take out their missile launcher, they eventually get it back online and land a few more shots on us, although they rapidly run out of ammo. When we take their weapons back down again – and then break their shields with our beam – they decide to run away, and unfortunately PvtUrist misses the next several shots, meaning we have no way to stop them fleeing, and they get away. I guess they're used to this sort of encounter.
This was a VERY BAD fight for us
Our ship is at CRITICAL DAMAGE
It's going to cost us ⛯52 to fully repair.
I have ⛯8.
Here's the other huge problem:
We absolutely need to buy fuel and even if we buy ALL the fuel at this store, we won't be able to get through the next sector on that alone.
Fuel is ⛯5 a piece.
I think we're pretty much screwed unless we can sell something.
If they're mantis (without an engi slave) or you think you can pull it off generally, shooting Bridge instead of Engines can be pretty effective since you're hitting a person in there, too.
Yeah, I find that's the case with ships that have a huge single weakness, too.
Like I'll be playing Rock A and I get a ship that has defense drones on an early jump and it's like "Well I can either spend at least 8 missiles in a really prolonged fight or I can just reset right now."
The worst is Stealth A and getting into a fight with a drone that's packing laser weaponry or drones. You just fold out on the spot, there, too.
At least with Rock A, you usually have the option of running.
The mod actually has some changes to reduce the chance of an early disaster when you're using a shieldless ship (although for the time being, it's just a reduction, not an elimination).
At least Stealth A has long-range scanners, so you can kind of try to fudge hitting non-combat beacons and hoping to gather enough scrap in sector 1 that way.
